Don't forget about π
this post was submitted on 20 May 2025
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Somebody gave me this clock…I just need the time.
Clocks should use 24h format. AM/PM is completely useless.
The french:
Goddamn metric time
Why the 'IIII' insted of 'IV'?
Prevents confusion between the four and the six: III, IV, V, VI, when the watch is not held perfectly vertically for viewing.
Actually very common in watches with roman numbers iirc
i'm pretty sure that IV is a modern typographic thing
I've also heard that, because in Latin IV is the beginning of "IVPPITER" (Jupiter), there’s a theory that people avoided using "IV" as to not “disrespect” the god’s name. 🤷♀️
Also, on a 12 hour clock, 3 sets of four, e.g.:
- I, II, III, IIII
- V, VI, VII, VIII
- IX, X, XI, XII
looks clean af I guess.
Don't listen to OP's bullshit.
They work for big clock. They're trying to convince you 12 hour clock is useless so they can sell you double the clock.
Look at this guy, only one clock. I keep two analog clocks in each room, the AM 12-11, and PM 12-11. The way it was meant to be.
IIRC they counted the bones in their fingers using their thumb and that gives 12. The first sundial was around the equator and there is always light for half a day, so half a day becomes 12 hours.
To count large numbers often one hand was used to count using 5 fingers and the other to count the bones, so you get 5x12 for 60 minutes.
AIUI there was an aspect in the divisibility of the numbers being convenient.
12 is divisible by 2, 3, 4, and 6. 60 is divisible by 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12, 15, 20, and 30.
10 is divisible by 2 and 5. 100 is divisible by 2, 4, 5, 10, 20, 25, and 50.
If you want to minimize dealing with fractions, 12 and 60 are far more convenient than 10 and 100.
That's an interesting thought, but I believe it to simply be a coincidence.
The base 12 counting being based on counting the division of your fingers is historically verified, but if the division aspect was so compelling to them you'd expect it to carry forward into their writing system.
By the time you get cuneiform math though, they actually go back to base 10.
https://images.app.goo.gl/9GR6VEiT7GHYF3KaA
As you can see base 12 is not in the written system, or for written mathematics. It just was convenient for counting on their hands.
They used mixes of base 10/base 12 and base 60.
Base 10 would be used go determine the symbols for a specific "digit" in base 60.
So similar to how our 13 is 1 ten and 3 ones, their 13 was the symbol for 10 then 3 symbols for 1. 13 = 𒌋𒁹𒁹𒁹 But 73 would be written 𒁹 𒌋𒁹𒁹𒁹
Which would be interpreted as 1 sixty and 13 ones, or 60 + 13
When I become dictator of the world, this will be the new time unit: https://metric-time.com/
The year will also have 13 months: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Fixed_Calendar
The year will be 12025: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_calendar
Because these things just make more sense. You will thank me after a few generations, because habits are hard to change.
If you make the 13th month a holiday with no work, you have my support .
Team 13-month-calendar assemble!
I haven't done enough digging on metric time, but if it's implemented as a UTC/global time I can get behind that. I'm sick of timezones and DST.
Gift from ancient Mesopotamia. Mesopotamians love 12 & base 60. They also liked 7. Those numbers recur in their mythology.
Americans have a weird fixation with 💯. Where Americans might use percentages, I've seen Japanese plot values in [0, 1] (ie, pure proportions).
A lot of people white knighting clocks in this thread
If you want to be mad about time then I'd like to introduce you to a little thing I like to call the Gregorian calendar.
At least our hours are the same length regardless of latitude now, so let's be grateful for that.
Days start at 0h, not 12h
It can't start at 12 hours if there are 24 segments.
And keep your letters out of it too.
The AM/PM bullshit:
AM: 12, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11
Then the same for PM. Who counts like that? Whats after 12? 1! What?
People who lived before the invention of zero counted like that!
I have no idea if that's true but I believe it
The idea of zero being a number rather than the absence of a number took a very long time to settle on. There’s a whole history book on the topic!
I listened to an audiobook about the history of zero years ago (can’t remember the name, might be that one). I thought it would be dull enough to fall asleep to.
It was not.
The galaxy-brained group known as "Z~12~ + 1". "What if we did modular arithmetic but one-indexed."
Edit: Actually, wait, it's worse: zero-indexing but we represent the zero element in Z~n~ as 'n'. Kill it with fire.
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I only recently learned the etymology of the word: "second"
Its name comes from being the "second" division of the hour, with the minute being the first.
I honestly hate this.
It's like bad world building for some throwaway fiction story.
I'll see you in 5 firsts, 2 seconds and 7 thirds.
Zero zeros?
Sundials.
Now if you want to get really pissed, the magnetic North Pole is actually the South Pole of the Earth’s magnetic field. We call it the North Pole because the north side of a magnet points to it.
Don't tell them about positive/negative electron movement.
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